Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CSCO) is closing out the week with investors balancing two powerful narratives: a multi-year reinvention story that has pushed Cisco stock back toward dot‑com era price territory, and a fresh cybersecurity headline tied to actively exploited vulnerabilities in certain Cisco email security appliances.
This article summarizes the most relevant news, forecasts, and market analysis circulating from December 20, 2025, with context pulled from company filings, major financial coverage, and security advisories.
Cisco stock snapshot: where CSCO stands heading into the Dec. 20 weekend
Cisco shares last traded around $78.42, reflecting the most recent market session data available (U.S. markets are closed over the weekend). [1]
Recent coverage has emphasized that CSCO has been trading near fresh multi‑decade highs, driven by a combination of AI data‑center networking demand and a stronger forward outlook into fiscal 2026. [2]
What’s “new” in the Cisco stock story since Dec. 20, 2025
Here are the main items showing up in investor feeds, reports, and filings around Dec. 20:
- Analyst outlook remains constructive: Morgan Stanley maintained an Overweight stance in a Dec. 17 note widely recirculated in weekend market roundups, alongside a broader “average price target” discussion. [3]
- Insider activity hit the tape: Cisco director Michael D. Capellas reported share sales on Dec. 18 and Dec. 19 in a Form 4 filing. [4]
- Security headline risk escalated: Cisco Talos published details on an active campaign targeting certain Cisco email security products, tied to CVE‑2025‑20393 and associated tooling (including “AquaShell”). [5]
- Institutional positioning stories circulated: filings-based writeups noted changes in fund stakes (a typical year‑end theme), though these are generally lower-signal for near-term price action. [6]
- Market-level analysis pieces proliferated: multiple outlets ran “how far can it go” and “what could derail the rally” articles as Cisco revisited long‑dated price landmarks. [7]
Why Cisco stock has been strong: AI networking demand and raised FY2026 guidance
A core driver behind Cisco’s late‑2025 rally has been the company’s positioning in AI-driven networking upgrades—including hyperscaler buildouts and enterprise refresh cycles.
In November, Reuters reported Cisco raised its full‑year revenue and profit forecast, explicitly pointing to robust demand for networking equipment amid data‑center expansion tied to the AI boom. Cisco’s updated outlook called for fiscal 2026 revenue of $60.2B–$61.0B and adjusted EPS of $4.08–$4.14 (versus prior ranges). [8]
That same report highlighted management commentary that Cisco expects $3 billion in AI infrastructure revenue from hyperscalers in fiscal 2026, and that Cisco secured more than $2 billion in AI orders in fiscal 2025, with $1.3 billion of AI infrastructure orders from hyperscalers in the quarter ended Oct. 25. [9]
A Zacks/Nasdaq analysis echoed these themes, pointing to:
- AI infrastructure orders and an expanding pipeline,
- continued momentum in networking product orders,
- and a reinforced fiscal 2026 outlook (repeating the same revenue and non‑GAAP EPS guideposts). [10]
Why this matters for CSCO investors: Cisco’s “AI angle” is not about GPUs—it’s about the switching, routing, optics, security, and software layers required to move AI workloads across campuses and data centers. That framing has helped the market re-rate Cisco from a slower-growth “legacy networking” name into an AI infrastructure beneficiary. [11]
Analyst forecasts: what Wall Street thinks CSCO could be worth in 2026
Analyst sentiment remains generally positive, but price targets diverge—reflecting different assumptions about:
- how durable hyperscaler demand will be,
- how quickly Cisco can expand software/security mix,
- and whether competition compresses margins.
A Fintel-distributed recap published via Nasdaq cited an average one‑year price target of $86.20 (as of Dec. 5, 2025), with forecasts ranging from $68.89 to $105.00. [12]
The same writeup also referenced Morgan Stanley maintaining an Overweight recommendation. [13]
Other market recaps around Dec. 20 repeated that multiple firms have been raising targets, reflecting the broader “AI networking tailwind” narrative. [14]
How to read these forecasts (without overreacting):
- Price targets are not “predictions” in a strict sense; they’re scenario-based valuation outputs.
- When a stock runs toward a multi‑year high, targets often rise after the move—because models get updated to reflect new guidance and sentiment.
The key new risk headline: Cisco AsyncOS zero‑day exploitation (CVE‑2025‑20393)
The most consequential non-earnings news affecting Cisco’s name this week is a security campaign involving Cisco AsyncOS in certain email security products.
What Cisco Talos reported
Cisco Talos detailed active targeting of:
- Cisco Secure Email Gateway (formerly Email Security Appliance/ESA)
- Cisco Secure Email and Web Manager (formerly Content Security Management Appliance/SMA)
Talos said Cisco became aware of the activity on Dec. 10, and that it had been ongoing since at least late November 2025. The campaign involves a China‑nexus threat actor tracked as UAT‑9686, and includes a persistence mechanism called AquaShell, plus tunneling/log-purging tools. [15]
How severe is the vulnerability?
The U.S. National Vulnerability Database lists CVE‑2025‑20393 with a CVSS 3.1 score of 10.0 (Critical) and notes it is in CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) catalog, with a listed due date of Dec. 24, 2025 for required action guidance. [16]
Which deployments are impacted?
Government and security advisories stress that exposure is configuration-dependent. Singapore’s Cyber Security Agency (CSA) stated the issue affects devices when:
- the Spam Quarantine feature is configured, and
- Spam Quarantine is exposed to and reachable from the Internet. [17]
The Center for Internet Security (CIS) advisory similarly described the vulnerability as allowing attackers to execute commands with root-level privileges under those same conditions, and noted the KEV listing. [18]
What it could mean for Cisco stock (CSCO):
- In many cases, vulnerability headlines don’t materially affect near‑term revenue unless they trigger customer churn, liability exposure, or a broader trust hit.
- However, because Cisco is also pitching “security + networking” as a combined platform story, high-profile campaigns can become a sentiment overhang—especially if patches/mitigations are viewed as slow or disruptive.
Insider activity: what a new Form 4 said
On the governance and sentiment side, investors often watch insider activity during big runs.
A Form 4 filed with the SEC shows Cisco director Michael D. Capellas reported sales of:
- 16,150 shares on Dec. 18, 2025 (with a weighted average price shown),
- 10,850 shares on Dec. 19, 2025,
and reported remaining beneficial ownership after the transactions. [19]
Insider sales can happen for many reasons (taxes, diversification, scheduled plans), but they reliably show up in “weekend recap” stock coverage—particularly when a stock is testing new highs. [20]
Strategy backdrop: Cisco’s “security + observability + data” platform push
Although not “new” on Dec. 20 itself, Cisco’s longer-term bull thesis has increasingly leaned on bundling across networking, security, and data/observability—an area strengthened by Splunk.
Cisco investor communications continue to position Splunk integrations as part of an “open data ecosystem” approach (for example, Splunk Federated Search integrations), aimed at unifying operational and business data for security and IT operations. [21]
This matters because software and recurring revenue tend to support higher valuation multiples than hardware-only narratives—one reason why analysts often focus on Cisco’s mix shift, not just unit volumes.
Dividends: why CSCO still shows up in income portfolios
Cisco remains a dividend-paying large-cap tech name. On its fiscal Q1 earnings release in November, Cisco disclosed a quarterly dividend of $0.41 per share, with a payment date in January 2026 (subject to standard record-date mechanics and board approval language). [22]
That dividend profile is part of why CSCO continues to draw a different shareholder base than many high-multiple AI pure plays—especially in late-cycle markets.
The 2026 outlook for Cisco stock: catalysts and watchpoints
If you’re tracking CSCO into early 2026, the story is likely to hinge on a few measurable signals:
Potential upside catalysts
- AI infrastructure order conversion into recognized revenue (especially hyperscaler repeat orders). [23]
- Enterprise campus refresh cycle holding up as budgets normalize. [24]
- Security + software execution, as Cisco tries to turn platform breadth into larger deals and higher recurring revenue. [25]
Key risks investors are watching
- Security incident overhang from active exploitation disclosures (timing, patching, customer confidence). [26]
- Competition in high-performance networking (where execution needs to remain “clean” to justify the recent re-rating). [27]
- Valuation sensitivity after a sharp run—meaning future beats may need to be bigger to move the stock the same way. [28]
Bottom line
As of the Dec. 20, 2025 news cycle, Cisco stock (CSCO) is being pulled forward by a clearer AI networking revenue path and raised fiscal 2026 guidance—while simultaneously facing a fresh, high-profile security campaign headline that investors will watch for containment and remediation progress. [29]
References
1. investor.cisco.com, 2. www.nasdaq.com, 3. www.nasdaq.com, 4. www.sec.gov, 5. blog.talosintelligence.com, 6. www.marketbeat.com, 7. www.trefis.com, 8. www.reuters.com, 9. www.reuters.com, 10. www.nasdaq.com, 11. www.reuters.com, 12. www.nasdaq.com, 13. www.nasdaq.com, 14. www.marketbeat.com, 15. blog.talosintelligence.com, 16. nvd.nist.gov, 17. www.csa.gov.sg, 18. www.cisecurity.org, 19. www.sec.gov, 20. www.sec.gov, 21. investor.cisco.com, 22. investor.cisco.com, 23. www.reuters.com, 24. www.nasdaq.com, 25. investor.cisco.com, 26. blog.talosintelligence.com, 27. www.trefis.com, 28. www.trefis.com, 29. www.reuters.com
